


Royal

by mcrystal7



Category: Life and Death - Stephenie Meyer, Twilight Series - Stephenie Meyer
Genre: F/M, M/M
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-06-06
Updated: 2020-06-30
Packaged: 2021-03-04 04:53:30
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 4
Words: 6,268
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24577861
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/mcrystal7/pseuds/mcrystal7
Summary: An adult Bella survives an attack by the Cullens. Now aware of the existence of the Cold Ones, she has to make sure her family and friends are safe, but is she foolish to do so with the help of a seemingly benign Cold One called Royal Hale?
Relationships: Bella Swan/Sam Uley, Jacob Black/Embry Call, Leah Clearwater/Sam Uley, Royal Hale/Bella Swan
Kudos: 3





	1. Chapter 1

Bella scanned the beach for Jacob and finally found him sitting on a log above the pebbles, far from the gray lapping waves. She smiled, thinking how this was so Jacob, not wanting to get himself wet. Not even by the ocean droplets that flew from the splashing waves onto his face and clothes.  
Bella rubbed her cold hands on the surface of her dark skinny jeans, before she walked to Jacob. He looked up and grinned when he noticed her approach.  
“Nice early morning,” he greeted her.  
Bella looked towards the horizon. “It’s a murky sky.”  
“For September in Forks, it’s a nice morning.”  
She raised her palms in the air in mock surrender as she searched the area around Jacob for another empty log next to him. Jacob pointed to one but before she went to sit there, she noticed the bunch of giant rocks on the beach.  
“What are those?”  
Bella walked closer to them. She noticed the rocks drew a perfect circle around an empty space in the middle. She craned her neck to observe that space and found its sand was clear, not even a pebble there, unlike the rest of the beach that was littered with them.  
“Ugh, Jake, why am I noticing that group of rocks for the first time in the godawful seven years I’ve been in Forks?”  
Jacob perfunctorily looked to his left where Bella was staring and shrugged. “I don’t know. And, Bella, those years weren’t godawful. You went to a high school where you made friends, you went to a college you liked enough, and now you’re working as an online editor for romance books. Your dream job.”  
“Right.” She nodded, gazing at the gray ocean. “I never get tired of yet another Austen-inspired modern day novel, believe it or not.”  
“Oh, I believe it,” said Jacob, but his laugh sounded a little too sarcastic to Bella. She wanted to respond to Jacob’s teasing but couldn’t take her mind off the rocks.  
“Seriously, Jake, they look like someone had deliberately placed them around like that.” She walked over to the rocks again, and peered at the empty space in the middle. “Not one pebble,” she shouted to Jacob over the sound of a crashing wave. “It’s weird.”  
“Bella, get your ass back here before I throw a pebble at you.”  
“Violence is unacceptable, Jacob, you bitch.”  
He laughed. She huffed and finally sat down on the log. “How does Embry tolerate you?”  
“He’s got his powers,” said Jacob with a twinkle in his dark eye. Bella inwardly smiled. If she didn’t know better, she’d take what he said literally, that him and Embry got supernatural powers with their natural beauty, effortless athleticism, and touch of mysticism from their heritage which Jacob referred to as superstitious. In fact, supernatural powers seemed to be what was needed in order to make a relationship last more than a year.  
“I wish I had something halfway close to what you and Embry have.”  
“Made your way with your truck here okay?” said Jacob in an attempt to steer Bella away from the subject but he was too late.  
Bella hung her head low, elbows resting on her knees, and huffed. “The only man I loved left me for another woman. It’s worse than him dying on me.”  
“Bella, please, don’t say that.”  
Her head snapped up at Jacob with a scowl. “Don’t say that? How would you feel if a hunk like Sam Uley who loved you and promised you the world suddenly decided a girl named Leah was way better and runs off with her, and now you are left alone in a house you once shared with your dad, who by the way is now living with his wife, who is no other than Leah Clearwater’s mother!”  
Jacob dug his face in his palms. “That was a year ago,” said his muffled voice.  
“Still hurts like it was yesterday,” cracked Bella, sitting up straight to stare at the ocean.  
It was as though instead of fighting against that subject to stop Bella’s agonizing, Jacob decided to go along with it, for the next words that fell out of his mouth were, “You know, Quileute legend talks about imprinting.”  
Bella tilted her head towards him. “What’s that?”  
“It’s like when two people meet they immediately know they belong together. It’s like a pull no other force in the universe can stop.”  
“I feel a pull,” said Bella. “Towards Sam. No matter what I do I can’t stop it. Certainly, there was no imprinting between him and me, for if there were, he’d be here now, telling us about the tide like he always did in that deep, sexy voice. Oh, Jake, I’m a mess.”  
“Well, Bella,” he said. “The reason I brought up imprinting is to point out that maybe this is what went on between Sam and Leah, a force in the universe neither they nor you had any control over. Quileute legend may just be superstition, but what I’m trying to say what happened with Sam is not your fault. Maybe the reason you can’t get over him is you feel it has something to do with you, when it possibly for sure does not.”  
A silence passed between them before Bella asked, “Is this what happened to you and Embry, imprinting?”  
“It’s legend,” brushed off Jacob.  
“You know what I mean.”  
Jacob became pensive for a moment, then shook his head. “When Embry and I met it was soft.”  
“Soft?” teased Bella.  
Jacob laughed. “No, really, like him and I had a long walk for our first date, and I remember going home that day feeling a kind of ease I never felt before. It’s strange how the ordinary has become a struggle, and the rare like Embry easy. The rest of our days together got spent in that same soft and easy mood. It’s not an uncontrollable or powerful pull towards Embry, it’s a, ‘Hey, I’m glad to see you here, now let’s go sit in the sun for a bit and take pleasure in life’s small joys’ kind of pull.”  
Bella nodded, feeling her face muscles relax. “I think I like that pull better than the one you claim Sam has towards Leah, and not just because I hate Sam.”  
“You don’t hate him.”  
“You’re right,” she said. “I don’t.”  
But her mood was better now somehow after what Jacob told her about Embry, and so she just spread her legs out on the pebbles in front of her and relaxed her shoulders, looking up at the sky. At that moment, some clouds cleared the space above her and the first rays of gold she’d seen this morning touched her cheeks.  
“So what do you wanna do today? Shall we take a hike or–”  
When Bella glanced up to see why Jacob stopped in the middle of his sentence, she found his jaw dropping towards the ground, his eyes wide as they stared at something past her shoulder. Bella looked in that direction.  
Something moved behind those giant rocks that formed the circle, and when Bella got up to go there, Jacob reached out and lay a hand on her arm, stopping her.  
“Could be an animal,” he whispered. “I never saw anything move that fast.”  
Bella remained standing in her place. Jacob was right. Some animal attacks were reported to have happened nearby that area, so she had to lay low. Jacob fixed eyes on her were full of warning for her not to move. Already feeling some fear creep onto her, she decided to focus instead on the fleeting rays of sunlight that shone on her. It worked for her mind immediately went somewhere else, to Phoenix where she once lived. Maybe she was mad that she’d stayed in Forks for Sam. Maybe she was mad at the different life she could’ve had, but some wise person told her to not think that way, so Bella refocused her mind on the present, on the possible animal attack, and relaxed a little.  
As soon as the brief sunlight disappeared behind gathering clouds, Bella felt something chilly at her back, though there wasn’t any breeze that hit her. It was as if someone opened a freezer door inches behind her, and when she looked down at Jacob, she noticed his eyes were even wider, less scared, but more surprised. She turned to look behind her at what he was staring at, and shuddered.


	2. Chapter 2

Bella couldn’t believe her eyes. What was standing in front of her had to be a vision, that skin was unreal. So pale, almost lustrous, even in the gloomy weather. That person’s hair reached her shoulders in smooth reddish brown locks with windswept long bangs falling to the side. She wore designer jeans and a leather jacket, her posture perfect. Her eyes a sweet beckoning golden brown.  
“Hi,” she said, giving Bella and Jacob a polite nod, not the manners of a millennial, though the woman looked Bella’s age, around twenty-four. “I’m Edythe Cullen.”  
“H – hi,” stuttered Jacob, and Bella gulped. Despite their preferences, Edythe Cullen had some sort of attraction power over them. Not just because of her beauty, there was a regal air to her, also a mystical one like what Bella accused Embry to have.  
“I’m, uh, Bella and this is Jacob. Nice early morning.”  
Jacob frowned at Bella for using his words.  
“Are you a tourist? I don’t think I’ve seen you around.”  
“Oh,” said Edythe in a delicate voice. “No, I’m not a tourist.” She didn’t give any further explanation, although her eyes seemed to laugh at Bella, as if Bella was missing something obvious.  
“Are you relatives of some folk here?” guessed Jacob, but Edythe shook her head.  
“I’m here with some friends.” Edythe averted the subject. She looked over her shoulder and gesturing with her hand at the rocks. Two other figures appeared from behind them, and walked out of the empty sandy space between the rocks to stand a few inches behind Edythe.  
They were both as sickeningly beautiful as Edythe, also pale with golden brown eyes and also around Edythe’s age. One of them, the shortest of the three, was a woman with short ragged black hair, wearing a green fifties style dress. The other was a tall blond man with an evident vertical scar on his lower lip, his hair fell ruler-straight to one side his neck, and shaved on the other. He had the hippest presence of the three, as if he actually belonged to this century.  
“This is Alice Cullen and Jasper Hale.”  
“Alice Cullen?” said Bella. “I thought you said they were your friends. Are you sisters?”  
Edythe giggled and covered her mouth with her hand. “Oh, sorry. Allow me to further explain. Alice used to be my friend, but now she is a part of my clan. So is Jasper, but he chose to keep his original last name for… some reason.”   
Edythe gave Jasper a bitter glance when she added that. Jasper shifted uncomfortably in his place. Bella observed that, and was about to ask another question, when Edythe interrupted.  
“Guys, I think we’ve had enough introductions, don’t you think? Let’s commence our breakfast party.”   
The two people in her so-called clan, whatever that was supposed to mean, nodded, their eyes fixed in a strange way on Bella and Jacob.  
Edythe’s exquisite face tilted. “Would you care to join us?”  
Before Bella or Jacob could reply, someone called from the woods behind them.   
“Jake!” It was Embry, who appeared running and out of breath from between the green trees. “Jake!”  
Jacob stood up, turning around to face his boyfriend. He reached his hands out to Embry, who placed his palms on Jacob’s.   
“What is it?”  
“Billy called me. He couldn’t reach you.”  
“My phone has run out of credit.”  
“Mine’s in my truck,” said Bella when Embry lay his questioning eyes on her.  
“Whatever,” said Embry, looking back at Jacob. “Your dad asked me to come get you. Apparently, there are some strange folk visiting La Push that he wants to warn you of.”   
Immediately, Jacob and Bella both turned to look at the three people still standing behind them, as still as mannequins. Bella’s heart raced when she saw the look on Edythe’s face. It was pure antagonism. Bella had no idea why she sensed a threat from that look.  
Embry noticed the trio for the first time now, his jaw hung low and his focus seemed far off this planet when Bella caught him staring at them. Especially at Edythe Cullen.  
Edythe smiled and her neck gave an elegant bend as she looked back towards Alice and Jasper. “The more the merrier, right? You haven’t told us your names, by the way,” she added, turning back to Bella and her friends.  
“I’m Bella, uh, and this is Jake… Jacob, and, uh… Embry.”  
“How sweet,” said Edythe, placing her fingertips together. Bella didn’t know whether the beautiful stranger was mocking them, or if she seemed really inexplicably glad to bump into them. Bella decided it was both when Edythe gently gestured with one of her raised palms at the group of friends then towards the circle of giant rocks. “Now, come, come. Join our breakfast party.”  
Embry looked frozen in place, Jacob hesitant. Bella took one glance at them, another at Edythe, then started marching towards the rocks.  
“Wait, Bella.”  
Bella huffed, and marched back to Jacob.  
“No,” she whispered to him. “I’m bored of my life. I haven’t conversed with anyone new in six years. I’m tired of Forks, and tired of wallowing in heartbreak all the time. I need to broaden my horizon, and those are the first strangers we’ve met in a decade. I’m joining them.”  
“Bella,” warned Embry. “Those could be the folk Billy is warning us about.”  
“Yes, I’m sure beer bottles left on the beach is bad form and alcohol at six am is bad for my health, but like I said, I’m joining their party.”  
“Uh.” Edythe seemed to have picked up their quiet conversation despite standing out of earshot. “There’s no alcohol, but I bet you there’s something better.”  
Jacob stared with a frown at Edythe’s bizarre smile, then lowered his face to Bella. “Those people seem weird, and we have no idea where they came from or what they want from us. Please, Bella, let’s just heed Billy’s warning and go.”  
“Look, I’m sure it’s nothing. I don’t mean to be rude, but Billy believes in the superstitious beliefs your ancestor tribe seemed to hold. Remember when he kept telling us those animal attacks near La Push beach aren’t really animal attacks and we should take care? Seriously, like what the heck? I’m joining those people’s party. Don’t worry,” she added, leaning towards Jacob’s ear. “I will say no to drugs.”  
“Bella,” called Jacob after her but to no avail.  
Bella skipped happily with the exotic trio towards the circle of rocks. “How did you manage to not get any pebbles in that space, and those rocks are like a perfect circle,” she mumbled to Edythe. “Any idea how that happened?”  
“Oh, we just like to build a nice little cozy space for ourselves.”  
“So you got big beach cleaning machines?”  
“No, we constructed this circle with our bare hands.”  
Bella wanted to laugh at Edythe’s joke, but she didn’t know why Edythe’s tone of voice didn’t call for that. Just then, she tripped on a branch and fell against Edythe’s back. The woman felt like she was made out of rock. Bella shivered all over when Edythe helped her back to her feet.  
“Are you okay?”  
Edythe’s face seemed aware of Bella’s shock. But maybe Bella imagined the whole thing. Or she would’ve convinced herself she imagined it if her hands weren’t still in Edythe’s helping ones, and if Edythe’s fingers didn’t feel like they were made out of cool raw diamonds.  
“I… I have to go back to my friends. Maybe I’ll bump into you later.”  
She turned to make her way back to Jacob and Embry, when Edythe’s hand clutched tighter around Bella’s, almost cracking her bones.  
This time, when Bella met Edythe’s eyes, which were golden brown a second ago, she found them turn to complete black. With her insides jerking with nerves, Bella wanted to struggle for freedom, but knew the strange woman’s hold on her surpassed any physical strength Bella would put forward. Not to mention Edythe’s other two affiliates.  
Bella wanted to call out to Embry and Jacob, but some instinct told her being outnumbered wasn’t the risk her, that she’d put her friends in danger even if they had heftier than this pale trio.  
Without any idea what else to do, Bella let Edythe “lead” her to the circle of rocks. She landed on the smooth clear sand, and once she was out of Jacob and Embry’s view, Edythe grabbed the back of her neck and slammed Bella’s head against the grainy surface. Bella shut her eyes, her teeth hurt from the sand and her cheek burned from the slap her face suffered from against it.  
Her arm lifted and when she peered out to see sunlight shining through clearing clouds, she found Alice and Jasper each raising one of her wrists to their lips. Maybe she imagined it, but their perfect pale skin now seemed to glisten where the passing sunlight hit. Edythe’s sweet scent became stronger in Bella’s nostrils as the reddish-brown-haired leaned in towards her neck, her locks brushing against Bella’s skin, which beat out of nerves.  
“Dig in,” ordered Edythe. Alice and Jasper’s mouths opened wide, showing a gleaming set of teeth. They were about to sink those teeth in Bella’s wrists, when a monstrous howl sounded through the rocks. Edythe sat up, her hair had lifted from Bella’s neck.  
“It can’t be,” whispered Edythe. Alice and Jasper dropped Bella’s hands, darting towards the other end of the circle of rocks in a speed Bella’s senses couldn’t comprehend, when something else that matched their speed pounced on them, splashing disturbed waves of sand as it held the two to the ground.  
Bella’s heart raced, and she sat up when Edythe let go of her.   
What’s that now? thought Bella, staring at the big furry animal. A gray wolf.


	3. Chapter 3

Bella saw a bronze and tan flash out of the corner of her eye, and in that same moment, found Edythe riding the wolf’s back, tackling him till he writhed away from Jasper and Alice and had its neck bent against the rocks by Edythe.  
“Embry!” a yell sounded behind her. It was Jacob. Embry was no longer next to him, but Jacob’s eyes were full of horror as they stared at the battle going on in front of Bella. Bella’s already tumultuous heart sank, if Embry wasn’t with Jacob, where was he? And why was Jacob yelling in Edythe’s direction?  
Bella wasted no more time with questions. She lifted herself up on the rocks, looking past them. “Jake! Jake! Get out of here! Please!”  
But Jacob paid no heed to Bella, he kept staring at Edythe, who was now being attacked by the recovering wolf, and yelled “Embry!” again.  
“Come on,” Bella heard Edythe say. She, Alice, and Jasper were now standing next to Bella, the wolf still on the other side of the rocks.  
“What the hell is going on?” Bella felt like she was at a movie, someone jump cutting scenes from the speed all those creatures seemed to move at.  
“Let’s go,” said Edythe, watching the giant wolf crouching in their direction. “This wolf has a pack, we don’t want them to come here.”  
Those were the last words Bella heard Edythe say before the trio disappeared from beside her. All she noticed was a flash against the forest border, and then everything was still again.  
Except… there was still a wolf standing over Bella. She stared up at his eyes, trying to wonder whether its attack on her would be swift or brutal. Before she could let her aching body relinquish to the ground, the wolf dropped on the sand. Its body still.  
Bella pulled herself to her feet and started to climb out from the circle of rocks, when Jacob sped towards her, climbing in.  
“Embry,” he yelled yet again.   
“What the fuck, Jacob? Get out of here!” Bella slammed her body against his to stop him from reaching the wolf but that only got her pushed out of the way and taking a rough butt land on the sand.  
“Embry, are you okay?”   
Rubbing her arms and abdomen to recover from the fall, Bella looked up and gaped. On the sand in front of her, where Jacob was kneeling down, Embry lay, naked and unconscious inside a huge dent the size of the wolf. Bella searched the areas, but the wolf had disappeared.  
“Jake…” she whispered, but he only leaned his face to the unconscious Embry, sweat and now tears damping Jacob’s cheeks.  
“He’s not breathing, Bella. Bella, what can I do?”  
Bella rose to her feet, turning to fetch her phone from the truck, when she heard Embry coughing.  
“He’s okay, Bella. He’s alive.”  
But she climbed out from the behind the rocks. “I have to call the ambulance.”  
“Wait,” said Jacob, nodding at Embry, who must’ve whispered something to him that Bella didn’t catch. “Don’t call the ambulance. Call Billy.”  
Something twisted in Bella’s stomach as she now realized what had happened. Embry was that wolf, he’d transformed into a wolf. There was a story like that in Quileute legend, protectors shifting into wolves. But… this was reality, wasn’t it?  
Without further crazy thought, Bella ran to her truck.

***

Embry was wrapped in a blanket with hot tea on the front porch of the wooden house where he and Jacob lived. Bella sat on the steps next to him. Jacob walked out of the house with more tea, giving Bella her mug before he joined them on the entrance stairs. The three of them sipped, watching the dark woods sprinkling with bouncing moonlight in silence.  
An owl hooted and Bella turned her head slightly to Jacob, hoping he would start the session. She didn’t want to impose on Embry as her blood boiled with one question after the other.  
Jacob noticed Bella’s small signal and while keeping his gaze at the woods in front of him, began the debriefing. “So all of it exists… the magic… everything?”  
“What the heck, Jacob?” shook Embry. “You saw me turn into a wolf right before your eyes. Are we going to go through that again?”  
His limbs quivered from the uncontrollable shaking that had overtaken Embry since the incident that morning. His whole body burned, Bella could feel the emanating heat from three feet away. Billy said that was the after effect of Embry’s sudden transformation, his physical body wasn’t used to it so it would take him time to adapt. He’d fallen week all day, but when he felt better around the evening, able to stand and walk for more than a couple of minutes Jacob took him home.  
Bella didn’t have the guts to drive to her own home yet. She glared at Jacob, also wanting him to ask the next question as the first one didn’t really count as one.  
Jacob gave her a faint nod, pressed his lips together before he glanced at Embry again. “And those, uh, what did Billy call them?”  
“Cold Ones,” muttered Embry, his face was to the ground, his dark brows knitted. Bella sensed that some of his shaking was due to heightened irritability. She would feel that way too if it was her first day learning that magic was part of her anatomy and that she had what Billy called the wolf gene in her.  
“Right,” said Jacob in a nervous tone as if he’d forgotten how to speak to his boyfriend. Bella felt for him. He must’ve been trying so hard to act normal around Embry, and without much success, which agitated poor Jacob more. “The Cold Ones’ arrival to Forks is what triggered that wolf gene in you?”  
“I needed to save Bella.” Embry shrugged.  
“Thank you again.”  
Embry gestured to Bella as if to say don’t mention it, and don’t remind me.  
Jacob hesitated. “What else did Billy say to you?”  
“He said that the Cold Ones won’t come back for some time. He said that the leader is telepathic and she read Embry’ mind, she knows I don’t know about this pack I’m supposed to be a part of, but Billy said that she must’ve been aware I would find them soon. This ought to keep them off our trails for a while. Out of Forks forever, but that’s if they hadn’t come to Forks for a particular purpose, which Billy senses they have. They’ve been in Forks before, but that was a century ago.”  
“But,” said Bella, freaking out. “Even if they don’t come back here, there are still people on this planet that will sure bump into those creatures, and those people will get hurt.”  
Both Jacob and Embry looked at her, their faces overcome with the same horror. The animal attacks that had been reported in Forks a few days ago, well, that was now clear to Bella and the Quileutes what they were.  
“I hope Charlie doesn’t find out about this,” Bella said. “He’d worry about me like hell. Do you think Sue Clearwater will tell him?”  
“I don’t think she has a good reason to tell him… yet.”  
Her body clenched at Jacob’s words. She hoped there would never be a good reason for that, that the Cold Ones would be gone from here forever. But that new danger to humans Bella had just learned about would still exist in the world, whether she’d bump into it again or not, and that freaked her out. Especially since it didn’t have any antidote.   
Well, except one antidote.  
Bella studied Embry before she spoke. “So the wolves, you, are the only thing that can defeat the Cold Ones.”  
“One wolf, no. A pack, yes. Depending how many Cold Ones we’re fighting. We should not be outnumbered. God, I can’t believe my mind has picked up on everything Billy had explained to us so clearly. In this state I’m in, I’d expect me to not even remember my name.”  
“It’s okay, babe, it’s okay. I’m here,” Jacob soothed him, laying an arm around him, but Bella could notice the layer of water in her best friend’s eyes. She shivered, tightened her arms around her own body and looked back towards the woods.  
“What are we to do now?”  
“Bella,” Jacob said, gravely. “You can’t sleep in your house alone tonight. You’ll stay here.”  
Her eyes glanced towards Embry before she averted them and looked to the floor, brushing her long strands back. Her house, with Charlie gone as he now lived with his new wife, sat empty as it waited for her to arrive that night. As her main home now, she loved it and found her place in it, but like Jacob said, it was impossible for her to be alone at night without knowing what was lurking outside her window. Those Cold Ones looked strong, break-through-any-sturdy-house-wall strong.  
Yet, what if they came for her again while she was sleeping in Jacob and Embry’s house. Embry’s body didn’t look like it could handle a second transformation in one day.   
“I’ll be fine,” Bella lied, climbing to her feet on the wooden steps. “Besides, Billy’s words made sense. If the Cold Ones were able to stay in any town they chose, it wouldn’t be the town with the wolf in it.”  
“He said that was true unless Edythe’s clan has come to Forks for a certain reason,” said Jacob. “What if they did, and now they’re gathering more troops of their kind to come and attack Embry, whom Edythe expects to gather his own troops.” Jacob glanced at Embry. “The werewolf troop.”   
Embry scathingly rolled his eyes. “Don’t call me a werewolf. What, are you also going to call the Cold Ones vampires?”  
Bella shivered again. A cold shiver, unlike Embry’s pulsating ones that were due to his raised temperature.  
“So,” said Bella. “Where are the other werew – uh, I mean, wolves?”  
Embry shrugged. “I’m the only Quileute who got triggered. Hopefully, this doesn’t need to happen to any more Quileutes."  
Jacob looked distraught. Bella wondered whether he felt guilt he wasn’t the one who’d turned into a wolf or whether he was scared of being triggered someday. It was surely both.   
“Um,” said Bella. “I’d better be going.”   
“Wait.” Jacob got up and followed her to her truck.  
After she opened the door of her truck, Bella turned to face him. His face, even in the dark, looked paler than usual and she had no doubt hers was the same.  
Jacob opened his mouth to say something but didn’t seem to find the words.  
“I’ll be fine, Jacob,” she promised again, climbing in the vehicle. “Don’t worry about me. Worry about you, and Embry. Not your relationship, though. That department’s workin’,” she added with a smirk and that seemed to lift up Jacob’s spirits a little.  
Bella shut the door of her truck, and waved as she drove away. She was thankful for her headlights that lit the path through the forest, and when she was finally near the cluster of small houses where she lived, she felt her chest relax. Maybe this was all a dream, what happened in La Push, maybe now she’d crossed the barrier between the world where anything magic existed and the real, logical, stable world she knew. She really started to believe that when something landed out of the sky in front of her truck once she parked it.  
Something that took the form of a human man. A man who was extremely pale with pitch black eyes.


	4. Chapter 4

Bella ducked under the steering-wheel of her truck, accepting this to be the last time she was going to see the light of the moon. Until a gentle, melodious voice said, “I won’t hurt you.”   
Hearing that voice was enough for her to want to climb out, to see the being that was linked to it, but she told herself this was only the intoxicating effect of the Cold Ones and stayed low.  
Not that hiding was of any use now.  
She regretted not having stayed at Jacob and Embry’s. The newly transformed Quileute wolf would have picked up the Cold One’s scent and would warn them before it reached the house. But still, the Cold Ones would have followed them, there was no escape.  
“Come on,” said the sweet male voice again. “I only want to talk.”  
Other than the intoxicating lull in that voice, Bella had sensed it was genuine. What other choice did she have than to face this doom, and if it did only want to talk to her then great, if not then she was only prolonging her fate.  
Gathering the last bit of strength she could find, Bella crawled out from the space under the steering-wheel, and looked out the window of her truck.   
Her heart almost rolled out of her chest once she regarded the beauty of the face staring back at her. Pale like she noticed earlier, with a hint of a glow on his high cheek-bones, could’ve been the moonlight or something else. Yet, despite the feminine nature of such a glow, it only made this being look more masculine, giving him the air of an invincible god. His honey-blond hair fell in smooth waves to his shoulders, and his lush lips beckoned Bella to sink her teeth into them like she would a ripe apple. There was a small vertical crease between his golden brows, but no other flaws were evident on his face or tall body, which resembled a star athlete’s.  
“Uh…” was all that Bella could let out.  
The being gave her a timid smile, as if he was aware of the effect his appearance had on her, and brushed his hair back in a self-conscious way, his face to the ground. This only made Bella’s knees weaken a lot more.  
“I’m Royal Hale,” he said before he turned his eyes back up at hers. He studied her for a moment, where Bella felt the air around her turn serious, and added, “You’ve met three of my kind earlier.”  
“Right,” said Bella, defensive. “Cold Ones, vampires, monsters. Are you here to suck my blood, too, because if you are get it over with. I’ve had enough for today.”  
Royal’s yellow brows rose up. “You do sound like it.”  
Bella dropped her jaw at him, tilting her head with a little laugh of disbelief. “I’m sorry if my anger at the kind of day I’ve had is too much for you.”  
“Oh, come on, that’s not what I meant,” he said, and put his hand on the knob of her truck door but didn’t click it open. “Can you come out so we can talk like two civilized adults?”  
Bella was the one who opened the door, but she did so with such force as if willing to slam it against that man, who only jumped out of the way in one agile, almost too-fast-for-the eyes move.   
“You don’t want your truck door to have a dent in the shape of me, do you?”  
Bella only glared at him. Royal put his palms up, laughing. “Look, I come in peace, okay? I actually need your help, and you’re better to talk to than the Quileute boys with the wolf genes. Those might rip my head off before I say the first word.”  
Now curiosity poured into Bella, and she furrowed her brows. “Do you know the other three Cold Ones? Do you know if they will come back here?”  
Royal’s lips pressed together, his hands slipping in his pockets. He stared at her for a long while, before Bella realized what he was asking of her. She gave a snort-laugh.  
“I’m not inviting you in my house.”  
“Where else are we going to talk civilly?”  
“Would you give up this civility shit? You’re a freaking vampire who is making contact with a human who just got attacked by others like you. I’m sorry if I’m not feeling very politically correct right now. Spill out what you need to say out here, and once you’re done, if you really are not going to hurt me, leave.”  
“Fine,” he said, rolling his eyes saltily towards the sky. Bella leaned her back against the driver’s seat of her truck, observing him through the open window. The stars seemed to reflect patterns on his translucent face and she fought everything in her to not let herself concentrate on that right now. But as she did, her mind carried a different thought, a question. What made her unable to fear this creature? It wasn’t him intoxicating her, she knew what intoxication felt like exactly, thanks to whatever she was called… right, Edythe. This, with Royal, it was something else. Something that calmed her senses, and at the same time made her heart race.  
“So?” she prompted. “Speak.”  
“Right,” he said, nodding. “But is going to be a lot for you to take.”  
Bella folded her arms against her chest. “I’m listening.”  
“Do you know Sam Uley?” As soon as this vampire said those words, everything around Bella turned dark again. She clutched a pain in the middle of her chest while Royal looked over his shoulder, and in the next second, he was gone. Leaped in a flash over her truck, disappearing into the nearby woods.  
“What the…?” muttered Bella, and at the same moment, a thump sounded outside her window, where Royal had been standing.  
“Embry?” she gasped, finding the giant gray wolf in front of her. The wolf pointed his snout in the air, sniffing before it lowered his furry neck and got transformed back into a naked Embry. An angry naked Embry.  
“Bella,” he cried, shivering with a high temperature, his eyes livid. “What the fuck?”  
“I know, Embry,” she said, stepping out of the truck. “One of them was here. But, wait, he didn’t mean any harm.”  
“I picked up his scent all the way from our house. What the hell, Bella?”  
“He wanted to talk to me. Embry, I don’t think the vampires we saw are out of Forks for good. And… Royal…”  
“Royal?” spat Embry.  
“Yes, that was what that vampire’s name was. He said something about Sam.”  
“God, Bella, you’re unbelievable. You’re talking nonsense. Why would a vampire mention Sam to you unless he had some kind of intoxicating delirious spell on you?”  
“He didn’t!”  
“Bella, you should’ve stayed at our place like we offered. You shouldn’t have come here alone.”  
“But Embry…” she let out, her gaze turning towards the woods where she’d last seen that speeding trace of Royal. “He knows something.”  
“Enough, Bella,” Embry snapped. “You’re coming with me.”  
Before she knew it, Embry had exploded back into a wolf. He lowered himself to the ground and fixing his massive eyes on her till she comprehended what he wanted her to do. Without another word, Bella climbed on his back, grabbing fistful of fur in each hand, pressing her knees as hard as she could around him, before she found herself dashing through the forest, in the other direction from where Royal had escaped.


End file.
